[Plugin] WireTool (Catenary) (1.4.1) – updated 06.03.2013

iichiversii

Another good tool concept. By the way, Remus Knowles has another version in the Plugins Index.

Any idea what his version is called?

Aerilius

Remus' plugin is the Simple Catenary Curve. It "just" calculates the curve for a given set of 17 points but it put me on the right path to look on Wikipedia after I had a paper full of integrals that didn't want get further simplified.

urgen

HA!...cool idea.thanks Aerilius

nektares

I always did this with splines, this is a much better and precise way to do it, Thank you!

sdmitch

When I tried the plugin, I kept getting a canatnary drawn from the origin to my first pick point. Adding a @state = 0 to the def initialize method fixed this problem.

Aerilius

Hi Sam,
thanks for the tip. I wonder why this happens, although the initialize method does not have @state=0, this should be set when the activate method calls reset.
Is someone else having this problem?

massimo

@unknownuser said:

Is someone else having this problem?

Yes the same here. Thanks for the plugin btw.

thomthom

create_geometry and draw_geometry can be refactored into one method that returns an array of point3d objects - the only difference between these methods are the final statement. DRY

Dave R

I didn't experience the same thing that Sam reported.

gullfo

i added the @state=0 and it made a difference in terms of being able to select the first point. very nice tool!

Dave R

So why don't I have this same problem? I didn't modify the script and it works fine for me.

wind-borne

@dave r said:

So why don't I have this same problem? I didn't modify the script and it works fine for me.

Which version are you using?
initial version works fine for me, updated version moves to origin.

Dave R

That would explain it. I didn't catch that there was an update because the thread title wasn't edited to show that as is SOP here.

Dave R

So now I've updated the plugin and added the line as mentioned. I get some rather strange behavior now. See the video.

[flash=420,315:13s7e1sa]http://www.youtube.com/v/7IJXmgk8lio?version=3&hl=en_US[/flash:13s7e1sa]

TIG

I have the original version [that works] if anyone wants it...

Dave R

I guess I'd be interested.

raineysky

I would very much like to have it if it makes rope. I tried it but got results like Dave shows in the video.

Dave R

That apparently fixed it. Thank you.

McGyver

This is very cool! Thank you!

Edited to add- This is REALLY cool! I was just messing around with it and it works great for something I was making. THANKS!

Aerilius

Tools normally don't have weird behavior without reason. Running it with the Ruby console open gives often more definable results.
So I found and fixed an unobvious bug with the translations that stirred up all methods and I changed that the x-width of segments is variable to give always the same segment length.